Dai Young is delighted to have been sent to Coventry. As the Wasps director of rugby reflects on a new season in which his team is regarded as a major contender, before Sunday’s match against Exeter, the team that pipped them to second place in the Premiership table last season and then knocked them out of the play-offs, the state of the club when he arrived in 2011 seems a distant nightmare.
Young joined from Cardiff Blues, where he had spent eight years, guiding the region to a European Cup semi‑final and the European Challenge Cup final two years later in 2010 when they defeated Toulon. As the recession hit Welsh rugby, so spending was cut but he joined a Premiership club that was even more hard up, struggling to pay bills and wages, and found himself locked in a relegation scrap.
“It is a much more pleasant environment here now,” says the former Wales and Lions captain. “Everything is far more positive on and off the field. That brings different pressures but I would much rather be in the situation I am in now than a few seasons ago when you wondered whether you would get paid or have a job the following week.
“The first couple of years at Wasps were tough. We were fighting relegation as well after a load of retirements and injuries and had to play guys from the under-20s. We should have gone down (in 2012 when they finished one point above relegated Newcastle). That would have been it for the club because we did not have a buyer on the horizon and did not have any assets, no ground or training facilities. I believe keeping us up was my best achievement as a coach. Newcastle went down but they were a better team than us. We found a way of staying up and it was remarkable.”
Wasps then played at Adams Park, the home of Wycombe Wanderers. The only income they generated from the ground was on match days, and then nowhere near enough as they built up a debt in millions with no means to repay it. In 2014 they moved to Coventry, quickly taking full control of the Ricoh Arena and gaining an asset that has allowed them to sign leading players from abroad: George Smith and Charles Piutau last season, Willie Le Roux and Kurtley Beale in this one, although their debuts will be delayed.
“Where we are now is completely different from a few years ago but we can only spend the same as everyone else. It does not matter how much money you have; you can only go to the level of the salary cap. We lost Charles Piutau and signed Willie Le Roux, which is where you want to be. What I want as a coach is two quality players in each position and the prospect of putting combinations together is mouthwatering when you consider the players we will have to choose from behind, with the likes of Le Roux, Beale, Danny Cipriani, Kyle Eastmond, Elliot Daly, Christian Wade, Frank Halai and Jimmy Gopperth in the squad.
“We are a long way off getting things all together but players will be putting pressure on each other and I will be able to rotate the squad so that nobody plays too many games. It will be after Christmas when we see everyone firing and, while we have signed players of top quality from overseas, having a strong English contingent is important to me: I was delighted to recruit Kyle, even though he was not a planned signing. We had a few injury problems and, when he became available, we jumped in quickly.”
Exeter will present a high opening hurdle. The two sides met five times last season and Wasps’ sole victory was at the Ricoh in the European Champions Cup quarter-final, and that was through a last-minute try. The Chiefs largely thwarted Wasps’ threat in broken play by keeping it tight and using penalties to force driving lineouts in attacking territory.
“We over-exceeded last year without a doubt,” said Young. “No pundits tipped us to be anywhere near the play-offs and my focus remains on ensuring that season after season we are in the top six. We have not achieved that much in the last 10 years. We have to be like Leicester, Saracens and Northampton, always there and playing consistently at European rugby’s top table. Of course we want to push for the top four and to win things, but if you offered me winning something this season and then being out of the top six for the next four or being in the top six for the next five, I would take the latter.
“We learned a lot from the two semi-final defeats, to Exeter and Saracens in the Champions Cup. It was a couple of games too far with a number of players tired and I should have rested some along the way. We need to get used to playing in big games. Sarries had a few failures before they won anything: the more you knock at a door, the better the chance of it opening.”
